The Osceola times., 1887-04-30
WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
Oliver wendell Holmes Impressions VI
r,yiand,s Most Notable structure


rnyiand,s Most Notable Structure.
J,hink no part of the Abbey is visited
with so much interest as Poet corner
We are all familiarly acquainted with
!, beforehand We are all ready for ~
rare Ben Johnson as we stand over
the place where he was planted stand
ING upright, as if he had been droppeu
| into a post-hole. We remember TOO
we'll the foolish and flippant mockery
of GAYS Life is Jest" If ! were n
dean of the cathedral, ! should be
tempted to alter the j to q. Then we
could read it without contempt; for
life is gest, an achievement-or al
ways ought to be. Westminster Abbey
is too crowded with monuments to the
illustrious dead and those who have
been considered so in their day to pro-
duce any other than a confused I'M
pression. When we visit the tomb OF
Napoleon at the Invalidcs, no side
lghts interfere with the view before us
IN the field of mental vision. We see
the Emperor; Marengo, Austerl'tz'
Waterloo, Saint Helena, come before us
with him as their central figure. so NJ
Stratford-the Cloptons and the Johh
Combes. with all their memorials, can
not make us lift our eyes from the stone
which covers the dust that once
breathcd and walked the streets OF
Stratford as Shakespeare.
All. but here is one marble counte'
nance that know full well, and knew
for many year in the flesh! Is there
an American who sees the bust of Long
fellow among the eiligies of the great
authors of England without feeling
thrill of pleasure at recognizing the
features of his native fellow-country-
man in the Vahalla of ancestral fellow
countrymcnp There are many memo
rials in Poets Corner and elsewhere IN
the Abbey which could be better spared
than that. Too many that were placed
there as luminaries have become con-
spicious by their obscurity in the midst
of that illustlious company. On the
whole, the Abbey produces distinct
sense of being overcrowded. 1t ap-
pears too much like a lapidary's store
room Look up at the lofty roof, which
we willingly pardon for shutting out
the heaven above us--at least in an
average London day; look down at the
floor, and think of what precious relies
il covers; but do not look around you
with the hope of getting any clear, con-
centrated, satisfying effect from this
great museum of gigantic funcreal brio
abrac Pardon me, shades of the mighty
dead! had something of this feeling, but
at another hour might perhaps be over
como by emotion. and weep, as my fel-
{ low-countryman did at the grave of the
earliest of his ancestors. should love
myself better in that respect than do
in this cold-blooded criticism; but il
|, suggested itself, and as no tlattery can
soothe, so no censure can wound, "the
dull. cold ear Of death
: OF course we saw all the sights OF the
q Abbey in hurried way, yet with such
Il guide and expositor as Archdeacon
b Farrar our two hours visit was worth a
' whole day with an undiscriminating
verger. who recites his lesson by rote,
and takes the life out Of the little mob
that follows him round by emphasizing
7 the details of his lesson until Patience
II on monument" seems TO be the suf-
II ferer, who knows what he wants and
what he does not want, the nearest EN-
: blem of himself he can think of.
I Amidst all the imposing recollections
: of the ancient cdificc, one impressed
l. me in the inverse ratio of its import
ancc The Archdeacon pointed out
\ the little holes in the stones, in one
D place, where the boys of the choir used
to play marbles before America was
discovered, probably--centurics be-
i fore, it may be. 1t is n strangely i'm
|, pressive glimpse of living past, like
. the grdfG of Pompeii. find it is often
e the accident rather than the essential
b which fixes my attention and takes
: hold of my memory. This is n tend
ency of which suppose ought to be
q ashamed, if we have any right to bo
$ ashamed Of those idiosyncra,ies which
: are ordered for us. II is the same tend
= cncy which often leads us to prefer the
q picturesque to the beautiful. Mr. Gil
p pin liked the donkey in forest land
Y scape better than the horse. A touch
= of imperfection intcrfcres with the
beauty of an object and lowers its level
to that Of the picturesque. The -acci-
. dent Of the holes in the stone of the mo-
: BILE building, for the boys to play mar
= bles with, makes me a boy again aud
|. at home with them, after looking with
: awe upon the statue of Newton, and
turning with shudder from the CHASTITY
( .lonument of Mrs Nightingale. - Olire,
n Wendell Holmes, IN atlantic.
!, Marrow of the Modern Novel,